All of the Gin Joints
by teawithmilk
Summary: All reunions are awkward. Silvaze.


Disclaimer: all characters are property of SEGA, Sonic Team and/or DIMPS.

_all of the gin joints_

* * *

Blaze is smaller than him, now. Still warm, still breathing; she's still young, barely looks as though she's aged a day since he last saw her, even though it's been years since she took Iblis away.

"I--" he starts. Stops. His hands are shaking. It's like seeing a ghost. "I--" And he can still feel the lingering heat from her, even though she's three steps away from him. "Y-you're back."

"Mm," she says, as though she hasn't just come back from the dead. "You look" she looks him over. He already knows she's going to lie. "well."

"I look _old_," he points out, with a forced laugh. "It's been eight years, Blaze." Almost to the day. He sobers. "Eight years..."

"Two. For me."

He works that out on his fingers and his toes in his boots -- it makes her sixteen (they had always assumed they were the same age when they met, not that it mattered, not back then). "Oh."

She doesn't venture anything else, but that was Blaze. She just stands there, silent and still and impossibly real, her eyes darting between him and the slow progress on the horizon. Her clothes are different, now, and the jewel he remembers being in her forehead when they were children is no longer there; instead, there's a scar that leaves a bare patch in the fur.

He has to ask. Has to. "And Ib--"

"Gone." She takes a step back, and the air cools. "Gone," she says again. "I wanted to make sure you knew that. It won't be coming back. Not here, or anywhere else."

"Okay." It comes out like a breath, and hangs between them. There are a thousand things he wants to do, wants to say to her. He wants to show her their old shelter, wants her to meet the family who are living there now, wants to show her rivers and oceans where life is starting again. He wants to introduce her to his friends, parade her around the city so that the people could look at the one who had saved them all, he wants to keep her to himself so she'll never leave again.

He doesn't. He feels like he's fourteen again, naïve and unsure. "I--" he starts. Stops again. "I'm glad."

She nods, and the silence hangs again; it takes all Silver has not to just haul her against him, wrap his arms around her and never let her go. But Blaze when they were children had rarely appreciated contact (her powers had never served her well in this regard, she had always - even though she had never said it - been afraid that she would burn him), and so he keeps still.

"It-- it's good to see you," he ventures carefully, and then he laughs. It's such an understatement. And he asks, because he has to. "You're staying, right? You're not-- you're not going to leave again, are you?"

"What?"

"Stay." Her eyes widen the tiniest bit - he almost misses it (it's been so long, too long since he'd last seen her), but when he realises, it hurts: _why would she not expect that? did she think he'd really say anything other than 'stay'? didn't she want to?_, and he takes a step forward, closing the distance. "It's been a while," he says, reaching for her hand, and for that moment, he can't stop himself. "I--I never gave up on you. I knew you'd come back here, I..."

He trails off.

"Silver--"

"Blaze?"

She doesn't look at him, and that won't do. "I'm not sure if that's wise."

"Why?"

She doesn't answer.

"Blaze." He closes the distance. "...Blaze..." He reaches over, traces his bare fingers down her arm. She's sleeveless, her fur stands on end when he touches her, and he can feel the soft thrum of fire beneath her skin. "I-- you came _back_. Don't go again."

"...you have your own life, Silver. I only came to find you to tell you of Iblis."

_You __are my life_, is what Silver thinks he should say, he's seen it in the movies salvaged from the archives, but he knows that it's not true and that even if it were, Blaze wouldn't want to hear it. He knows full-well what she means, and now he's old enough to really understand it. "That doesn't mean you can't be a part of it again," he says gently, and her eyes widen again. "I missed you when you were gone."

"Silver..." She doesn't move. He gets a little bolder, his fingers tracing downwards along her arm until he links them through hers -- and it's _then_ that she pulls back, uncomfortable, and it's okay. It's just another little thing that makes him sure that she's real - that this is really her, alive and in front of him and not being pulled apart again.

"...if you wanted to," he adds gently, and she softens.

"Perhaps a small part."

Silver can feel himself smile -- the biggest one in years, the biggest since the first trees bore fruit again -- and accepts that for what it is. "Okay," he says, nodding once, and doesn't mention anything else (she might take a small part, but he would make room for her to grow in a heartbeat). Instead, he takes her hand again, a little more firmly this time, and shows her the world she mended.

* * *

[a/n] so. that black knight game was pretty nifty, huh?


End file.
